FocusOn:Content MarketingA Virtual Event

Don’t miss FocusOn: Content, Digital Summit’s virtual event where four content marketing experts will teach you how to bring your content marketing to the next level. Ann Handley, bestselling author and Chief Content Officer of MarketingProfs, will kick-off the event with an example packed presentation on how to create great content for your audience. You’ll also discover how to leverage user generated content, how to optimize your content to reach your best prospects and more.

Ann Handley is a Wall Street Journal best-selling author, keynote speaker, and the world’s first Chief Content Officer. Ann speaks and writes about how you can rethink the way your business markets. Cited by Forbes as the most influential woman in Social Media and recognized by ForbesWoman as one of the top 20 women bloggers, Ann Handley is the Chief Content Officer of MarketingProfs. She is a monthly columnist for Entrepreneur magazine, a member of the LinkedIn Influencer program, and the co-author of Content Rules: How to Create Killer Blogs, Podcasts, Videos, Ebooks, Webinars (and More) That Engage Customers and Ignite Your Business (Wiley, originally published 2011. Paperback 2012.) Her most recent book, Everybody Writes: Your Go-To Guide to Creating Ridiculously Good Content (Wiley, 2014) is a Wall Street Journal bestseller.

Arnie KuennCEOVertical Measures

Arnie Kuenn is the CEO of Vertical Measures, a content marketing agency with an SEO foundation, focused on helping their clients get more traffic, more leads, and more business. Arnie has held executive positions in the world of new technologies and marketing for more than 25 years. He is a frequent speaker and author of Content Marketing Works. In 2014, Arnie was honored as the Interactive Person of the Year in Arizona.

Alan BelniakContent Marketing + Community Evangelist/ManagerAlignable

Alan has led content marketing, social media, and Community initiatives at Alignable, MathWorks, LogMeIn, and PTC over the past seven years. Ranging from SaaS-based offerings to locally-owned small businesses to CAD and product development software, Alan has been an integral driver in content and social media communications in B2B companies, both large and small.

Leigh GeorgeCEOFreedom

Marketers don’t just own the brand – they own the entire customer experience, but they get stuck in competing priorities, lack of resources, budget constraints, you name it. To eliminate the noise so marketers can act smarter and faster, Leigh launched freedom, a strategic branding, and marketing agency. Before starting her company, Leigh led branding and content marketing at a health non-profit, was VP in Ogilvy’s social@Ogilvy practice and led branding and digital strategy teams at several digital agencies in the DC area. She has a Ph.D. in branding history and theory – one of the few people in the country with that distinction.

Agenda: Social Media

Thurs., Dec 15 | 12:00pm EDT – 12:45pm EDT

Good Content vs. Good Enough Content: A Fight for Sore Eyes

Ann HandleyChief Content Officer, MarketingProfs

Why can’t quantity and quality get along? Why can’t they be friends? (At least with respect to your Marketing Content.) Guess what? They totally can! Come to this fun session to hear Ann Handley, author of Everybody Writes and Content Rules, counsel you on creating content that’s ridiculously engaging, because your audience demands it and your organization deserves it. The biggest missed opportunity in content marketing is playing it too safe.

After this session you’ll be able to:

Tell bolder (and braver!) stories, using stronger, writing and a unique point of view

Create “best of breed” content to attract the people you want

Know when to be a little outrageous (and when to dial it back)

Understand the secrets to inspire the best work out of writers and content creators

Thurs., Dec 15 | 1:00pm EDT – 1:45pm EDT

A Case For Leveraging User-Generated Content Inside Community Forums

Both long-form and short-form content have their places and serve us well. Often, people clamor to see what the subject matter experts have to say. What do you do when the subject matter experts are your community? How can you harness the power of user-generated content and make that a focal point of your content strategy? In this session, we’ll explore some elements that makes up a healthy community, how to spur conversations inside that community, foster engagement, and then re-imagine, re-use, and re-cycle that content into something new.

After this session you’ll be able to:

Better recognize sources of user-generated content

Train and cultivate better submissions from your community

Transform raw user commentary into user-generated content for use in your content arsenal

Thurs., Dec 15 | 2:00pm EDT – 2:45pm EDT

How to Breakthrough with SEO Optimized Content

Arnie KuennCEO Vertical Measures

Important Fact: 93% of all buyers, online or in stores, use search engines prior to making a purchase and 86% of searchers conduct non-branded queries. People want useful information, and they want to find it fast. In order to take advantage of this with your website, you need to understand how content marketing optimization works and what falls flat. Despite what some might say, this is not a “build it and they will come” environment. During this session, you will learn what it takes to capture as much search engine real estate as possible.

After this session you’ll be able to:

Understand the common optimization mistakes we see

Create and optimize the content your prospects are looking for

Use the best types of content for search engines

Protect yourself against changes in the future

Thurs., Dec 15 | 3:00pm EDT – 3:45pm EDT

Why Content Marketing is a Waste of Time…and What You Should be Doing Instead

Leigh GeorgeCEO, Freedom

With the internet and social media came the idea that brands could be publishers—owning channels where they could market to consumers directly. And now content marketing has grown to a $32.3 billion industry. Some brands even questioned buying and earning media at all. Why not just become the media? In fact brands like Red Bull and others have become true media companies. But in an age of infobesity when there’s more noise than ever with five exabytes of content created each day, do people really want more media? Is engagement through media the best option we have? Is there a better way for brands to connect with audiences? We’ll explore these issues and more in an energy packed session full of actionable insights.

After this session you’ll be able to:

Build your strategy around media and content—paid, earned and owned platforms—is all wrong